[News] The accident occurred around 9:30 last night
near Lewisporte, Newfoundland.
A van containing four professional wrestlers
suddenly plunged into a shallow stream.
Police in Newfoundland say they are
continuing their investigation.
Adrian Adonis!
[Audience booing]
Good friend called me. He said,
"Did you hear about Adrian?" I said, "No."
I phoned my wife, I said that I'm coming home.
And she said, "Okay, why? Did something happen?"
I said, "Yeah," I said, "everybody's dead."
♪
[narrator] On July 4th, 1988,
three professional wrestlers were killed
in a tragic car accident on a remote highway
in Newfoundland, Canada.
The most famous name among the victims was
World Wrestling Federation superstar ,
"The Adorable" Adrian Adonis.
The circumstances surrounding the crash have grown into
an urban legend in the wrestling world,
fuelling decades of debate and speculation.
A tragedy that took the lives of three wrestlers,
with one man left standing,
haunted by what he saw that night.
♪
I'll never forget it.
Yes, I am. Thank God for that.
♪
I'm gonna slap him around in front of all you scumbags,
you ignoramuses, and all you freeloaders,
and all you armchair quarterbacks.
And people, you think that you know about the
sport of wrestling, which you know nothing about.
In the 1980s, Vince McMahon's World Wrestling Federation
presented a larger than life world filled with heroes,
villains, and a rotating cast of colourful tough guys.
But few were more colourful than
"The Adorable" one himself, Adrian Adonis.
Adrian Adonis was one of the best big man wrestlers
in the game at the time.
Adrian Adonis was a really unique wrestler because
physically he had this body that didn't look like
it would be acrobatic.
-Look at that! -[Audience cheering]
And it was.
Unbelievable performer. Unbelievable.
His timing alone made him exceptional.
Oh, the dancing bear!
Look out, upside down and over!
Twinkle toes, man. The guy could move like nothing.
And regardless what these fans think,
Adrian Adonis is a devastating individual
in that ring.
Adrian's provocative ability to push buttons and
boundaries catapults him to the top of the card,
earning him a coveted weekly segment
known as 'The Flower Shop'.
You know, straight people hating gays was
certainly the idea behind the gimmick.
The business of pro wrestling was very, very stereotypical.
And very often it would be, you know, kind of fat guys,
with, that would bleach their hair blonde,
and that was kind of like your stereotype.
And I'm gonna say something right now,
and admit it right now, everybody wants to hear it
and I'm gonna say it. Yes, I'm gay.
[Audience booing]
Adrian knew the business well enough,
so he knew what he had to do to make people hate him.
And he did that.
[Announcer] There's not too much really that's adorable.
However, the star's flamboyant in-ring persona could hardly
be more different from the reality of the man
behind the character.
The black roots are showing in the hair, is that-
-[Laughing] -I'm natural.
What are you talking about?
He wasn't a bullshit wrestler.
He was a bonafide, legitimate tough guy
that had to have his fair number
of street fights in his lifetime.
I'm Bret "The Hitman" Hart, 7-time WWE World Champion,
WCW Champion, and a WWE Hall of Famer.
He's letting him use the fist. Oh, look at that!
"The Hitman" Bret Hart!
And I'm a very close personal friend
of the late Adrian Adonis.
Born Keith Franke,
the future Adrian Adonis grew up in a
working class neighbourhood in Buffalo, New York.
He's bread and butter Buffalo man, born and raised.
We grew up on the west side of Buffalo.
Rough neighbourhood. 90% Italian.
I'd never seen him lose a fight in my life.
As soon as he put that smirk on his face,
you knew you'd better get the hell out of there
or you're in trouble.
My name is Anthony Gugino,
and I'm a close friend of Keith Franke,
the wrestler Adrian Adonis, as you would know him.
You couldn't help love the guy, man.
He had a heart of gold.
I mean, he'd do anything for ya.
But if you crossed him, he'd pick you up and
body slam you- like that.
Like nothing.
Keith was my Luca Brasi.
I'm 5'5, 120 pounds.
He's 6'2, 240.
And when someone owed me money I'd just walk with
Keith my side: "You got my money?"
And they'd just look and say, "Yeah."
He was what they call very connected.
If you said, "I'm with Adrian," it's like it meant
you had a gold card to go wherever you wanted.
We started out as a high school fraternity, Kappa Beta.
From there we went to a street gang.
From a street gang we went to fighting with everybody.
We were the baddest in Buffalo,
so everybody had a target on us.
Most of our guys became gangsters.
But Keith had purpose, and why waste your life fighting
with these idiots when you could go and become something?
He knew he had to make a move,
and what he wanted was wrestling.
I said, "You want something, Keith, you gotta go for it."
Dropping out of high school to focus on wrestling,
Adrian brings his experience fighting in the streets
to the squared circle.
I watched Adrian when he first started
in Amarillo, Texas.
I was about 15 or 16 then.
Adrian announced to the audience that
he would take on anybody in the building.
♪
This advertisement says, "If you can stay in the ring with
Adrian Adonis for ten minutes, you could win $10,000."
And there'd be about 4 or 5 guys that would come down,
and they'd interview them, and talk to them
while they're outside the ring.
And then they would get in the ring.
Adrian would knock them out cold.
It gives you an idea of what Adrian was like.
He was a fearless kind of guy.
So you'd have to be a pretty tough guy to take on
all comers, you know, fight fans for real.
I mean, you don't know who the guy is.
My name is Dave Meltzer. I'm the editor of
The Wrestling Observer Newsletter
and I've been covering pro wrestling since 1971.
It wasn't enough to just out-wrestle the guy.
You know, he'll go and tell his friends,
"Hey, I hung with a guy." It's like,
you have to leave marks.
You have to pound his face in,
or break a bone or something.
And when he goes around town, it's like, "Oh, God,
those guys were killers." You know?
And Adrian was one of those guys.
In time, Adrian's size, look, and killer instinct lands him
a spot in one of the most popular promotions
in the business: Vern Gagne's
American Wrestling Association.
We all knew what he was. He was great.
I'm Greg Gagne.
I wrestled for 18 years in the AWA.
-[Audience cheering] -There's the Gagne sleeper!
My father was Vern Gagne,
a legend in the sport of professional wrestling.
And Adrian came in and Verne liked him right away,
liked his presence in the ring and eventually
they teamed him up with Jesse Ventura.
Well, somebody's going to pay for this.
Somebody's going to pay dearly for this,
ain't that right, Adrian?
Definitely, so let me tell you something, Stanley Blackburn...
Jesse was the better talker of the two,
but Adrian was not a bad talker.
He was a good talker,
and they played off each other really well.
He wore the leather jacket with the New York Yankees
insignia, which, you know,
in the Midwest that's good for being a heel.
You know, the New York biker type guy
going against your Midwest local heroes.
"The Golden Boy" Adrian Adonis!
Seeing him live in the AWA with Greg Gagne and
Jim Brunzell, and get punched and do these pirouettes.
And being whipped into the corner and doing that flip
that Ric Flair would do and just making little
Greg Gagne, you know, thin guy, look like,
you know, badass of all badasses.
Taking the dropkicks from Jim Brunzell.
And it was really there where he went from being what
I would call a really good wrestler to being a real star.
His bumps and his reaction and, you know,
his facial expression, and he was sort of
that bully on the microphone.
And a couple weeks ago I heard Ray Stevens had
Pat Patterson out here giving us a so-called challenge.
And he could back it up.
So, he was an exceptional talent.
Jumping Jim Brunzell!
I'm Jim Brunzell,
otherwise known as "Jumping Jim Brunzell."
[Audience cheering]
And I wrestled for 28 years.
Adrian knew when to get heat, and then he knew
when to give the babyface a comeback.
We were so proud of him.
One of our guys was actually making to be a star?
On TV we're watching one of our friends?
Grew up on the west side of Buffalo,
none of us had nothing.
You have no idea the parties we were throwing.
After years of building a name for himself in the AWA
and across the country, Adrian eventually signs with
Vince McMahon's WWF.
I got scars on my face,
I've had baseball bats across my shoulder.
By the time I got to the WWE in '84, I was nobody.
I was a little fish in a big pond,
and Adrian was a pretty big fish.
And look at confidence just oozing...
He knew everything about everything in the business.
I tried to bond with him and become friends with him.
I can remember going up to Adrian Adonis' room.
Jim Neidhart told me to come up,
and I can remember feeling kind of funny,
'cause I could tell like I wasn't welcome.
He doesn't trust being around me,
I'm a "promoter's kid."
I'm probably gonna tell on him.
And I can remember Jim, peeping through the peephole,
and I could hear Adrian, "It's Bret, don't let him in."
And then I could hear Jim go, "No, no, he's cool, he's cool,
he's totally cool, let him in." I hear the chain
come off and Jim was like, "Come on in."
Adrian, he's chopping up a bunch of cocaine
on a mirror, you know, he's chopping it all up.
A very, uh, telling kind of moment for me 'cause that
opened the door for me to sit in a room with Roddy Piper,
and Mr. Fuji, Iron Sheik.
Like, for me it was like
sitting under the learning tree.
I know I was doing lines of cocaine with uh,
all these guys until 4, or 5 in the morning.
They were all the most creative minds
in wrestling at that time.
This is so critical and important for me to be
in this room with these guys, listening,
and learning all these little secrets about the business.
Wrestling psychology.
-Woah, woah, wow! -[Cheering]
But I never ever look back on those days as
being wasted time.
Cocaine was about as prevalent as marijuana was
in the 60s. And I mean, everybody had it.
You'd meet somebody in the bar, you shake his hand,
and as soon as you shake his hand he'd squeeze a 8-ball of
cocaine into your hand, and basically
it was like a starter kit. "Don't worry, it's on us."
They'd give it to you and tell you, you know,
we'll get you down the road sometime, you know,
pay me back.
Adrian went hard every night. Every night.
If you looked up "party animal" on the dictionary
there'd be a picture of Adrian Adonis.
The problem with cocaine, it was how it could
turn around and become a monster in a short time.
And then you're sitting at home watching soap operas
in the middle of the afternoon and
you're going, "It's all... it's all over."
♪
252 pounds...
Adrian Adonis!
Joining the WWF roster during its 1980s golden age,
Adrian Adonis seems destined for greatness.
But behind the curtain...
the trappings of success begin to take a toll.
There was a lot of wrestlers that were
strung out on cocaine.
And we started to realize it wasn't the friendly drug that
we all thought when we first started snorting it.
It's a bad drug that you gotta wean yourself off of
and stay away from.
Me and Jim Neidhart, we had the white flag up.
We had nothing left in the tank like,
we can't do anymore drugs and late nights.
We kind of stopped kind of partying with everyone
because it was just too, too much.
They were all coke heads. Don't let nothing fool ya.
They were all partiers.
There wasn't nobody in that business, maybe a few.
You could probably get 1 out of 100 who wasn't a partier.
I mean, it was nothing but a party.
They entertained, had a good time, but they partied.
I remember one night I just had the rest of my beer and
I was going to bed,
and I heard this knock on the door.
So I open the door and here's Adrian. [Laughing]
And he says, "Goddamn it, Jimmy, I'm gonna kill myself.
Take this bag of cocaine and keep it for me."
I said okay, you know?
About 4 and a half hours later, I hear bam bam bam
at the door, and I thought, what the heck, you know?
It's like 5 in the morning.
So, I open the door and Adrian's fit to be tied,
he says, "Brunzie, where's the goddamn coke?"
He said, "You better not have taken any."
And I gave it to him and out he went.
♪
I just remember thinking, his wife has no idea.
I doubt he ever does stuff like that at home.
When he was with his wife,
he was a completely different guy.
Talk about Jekyll and Hyde.
I don't know if there's anybody that I know of
that was more of a devoted, loving, family man
that loved his wife, loved his kids.
The way he talked to his wife was like,
she was like an angel.
And I remember he'd pull her chair out and
slide it back in when she sat down.
It's like, he was such a gentleman.
I almost thought it was a put on at first.
I was 19 when we met.
I knew what I was getting into with him.
I think to have that strong bond with a wrestler
you have to really love each other.
This was his dream and I wanted it for him.
My name is Bea Franke Hall
and I was married to Adrian Adonis.
Home life, that was different.
He was definitely not the same as
you would see in the ring.
No, he was a very gentle, kind, loving,
flowers, jewelry- sweet, sweet man.
I would wake up and he'd have breakfast made for me and
bring it to me in bed.
They had such a close relationship even though
he was gone a lot of the time,
but he would call several times a day.
She's, you know, always,
I remember her talking about the collect phone calls,
the bills would be outrageous.
They just had a really good relationship,
I mean, their personalities meshed well.
I'm Gena Banta, and Adrian Adonis was my father.
Thought I was the coolest kid ever.
I had a Peewee Herman signed poster that he got for me.
I am Angela Perides
and I am the oldest daughter of Adrian Adonis.
Watching 3 Stooges,
that's, was something that he loved to watch.
It was always on when he was home.
In his big bag that he would take on the road there was
always just presents, gifts, we were gonna have fun.
Dad was home.
I think I was a good wife.
He trusted me totally.
I never screwed around, I never asked questions.
I think we had an awesome relationship.
I could not get mad at that man.
I could not.
Despite his stable home life, Adrian's cocaine addiction
causes his in-ring style to become even more vicious...
Ultimately damaging his reputation backstage.
Whoa!
He was edgy. [Laughing]
I mean, he was edgy. He had a temper.
You see the sadistic come out of Adrian now.
If I know Adrian, he's gonna get real nasty right now.
Coked up Adrian Adonis would be very, very rough on guys.
And if they complained, it's like well,
you're not tough enough for this business, get out.
Wow, a lot behind those knees.
The thing about all those kinds of things is
every dog has its day.
There's always going to be somebody that can
whip your butt sooner or later.
Uh oh, uh oh. My goodness.
In 1985, Vince McMahon decides that Adrian's
character needs a dramatic makeover,
from New York City tough guy
to something completely different.
You look a whole lot different.
When Vince took over in '84,
it was more and more about colourful characters.
It was not as much about tough guys.
You know, everybody had to have a gimmick,
and that Adrian Adonis gimmick he didn't see as
a main event gimmick...
the New York tough guy thing.
The leather jacket is gonna be retired.
Weighing 281 pounds,
"The Adorable" Adrian Adonis.
Well uh, there are certain things that defy description.
The idea of the, the gay character...
That was not super common, but it was absolutely there.
You know, starting with Gorgeous George.
So of course, you know, when something is successful
in wrestling everybody copies you.
So he, he went from, yeah, the Adrian Adonis
black leather New York tough guy thing, and then, uh,
they started doing vignettes where he was, you know,
embracing his other side.
May The Rockettes eat your heart out.
[Laughing]
I'll tell ya, when he, they made him dress up with uh,
the perfume thing and as a homosexual,
none of us liked it, but we understood it.
Just look at him.
He was too good to be doing what McMahon wanted him to do.
But up there that's the way he had to survive.
They, they, they do not approve apparently.
If he had to do that, he had to have a gimmick.
He had to be this big,
like Gorgeous George for Vince to give him any credit.
When they say when he goes out on the town that
he's a gay blade, I don't know.
[Laughing] What do we say there?
I don't know that Adrian liked the idea at first,
but I think he did a quick turn around.
You know what, I'm gonna just prove to you that I can do it.
That I'm that talented, that I can take something
as stupid as that and make it work and uh,
I'm gonna prove that to you.
In May of 1986, Adrian is set to wrestle
a relative newcomer to the business.
I was scheduled to work with Adrian because
Adrian was getting ready for a run with Hogan.
Chicken champion, Hulk Hogan.
Let me tell you something, Adonis.
So, they give Adrian people to beat up
and be impressive with.
I was kind of looking forward to it because Adrian,
you know, was a, one of the main guys.
Hi, everyone, my name is Dan Spivey.
Formerly known as "Dangerous" Dan Spivey.
Spivey looking absolutely fantastic.
I was new into the wrestling business.
I'd probably only been in there a little over a year.
I guess Adrian thought I was just some young guy.
An easy big guy.
I was always quiet, didn't have much to say,
and so I guess he took that as weakness.
And he was wrong.
Pitted against Spivey,
Adrian will learn just how wrong he was
in a match that will change his life forever.
He just exploded.
All of a sudden, he let off and he hit him in the head
with a left hook and said,
"I'm gonna kill that son of a bitch."
♪
In the lead up to his showdown against
world champion, Hulk Hogan, Adrian Adonis is
set to wrestle and defeat Dan Spivey,
solidifying his position as one of the top villains
in the company.
Of course, I had in the back of my mind that he was uh,
also a tough guy, and you know,
I heard that he would take advantage of guys.
So, I had mixed feelings about wrestling him, and uh,
sure enough, we got in the ring and he started
kicking me really hard.
Calling me a stupid son of a bitch, you know...
and just abusing the shit out of me.
Adrian Adonis wasting no time in taking advantage of
the inexperience of an older boy.
I was pissed after the match.
I was gonna fight him right there.
And then, uh, Davey Boy and Dynamite and Scott McGhee
grabbed my stuff, they got us in a cab,
and got me back to the place.
Got me out of the coliseum.
So the next night, we were in Flint Michigan,
and it was sold out, 10,000 people.
Vince says, "You guys are working together."
I said, "Okay."
Bob Orton and I had heard there was some bad blood and
it had been building between Adrian and Danny Spivey.
We were hoping that the match should get by.
He was supposed to win. Beat me with something,
I don't remember what it was, but he was going over,
which was expected.
But he started the same shit with me again.
When I was on all fours, he knocked the air out of me,
and then he got me in a sleeper hold and he was
really cinching down on it and I just had enough of it.
♪
And I kind of snapped.
I came up swinging and I knocked him out.
The Referee says, "Dan, that's not the finish."
I said, "I changed the finish.
He's not going over tonight."
♪
So, Bob and I run into the ring because I didn't want,
you know, Danny to kill him.
Please, let's go back to the locker room.
Everybody was going crazy running around
the dressing room.
I'm still pissed.
And then all of a sudden, the door opens up.
♪
And Adrian is coming.
♪
He starts talking to Danny, you know,
like he was going to apologize or something.
And then he goes to leg dive Danny.
♪
Spivey, you know, he was a quiet guy.
If you poke a dog a number of times
he's gonna bite your ass.
You can imagine a guy, 6 '7, you know, 280 pounds,
throwing a punch from down by his knee.
An upper cut.
Lifted Adrian up in the air
and Adrian came down like a walrus.
Boom!
And he just rolled his eyes back and
you could see his cheekbone.
The white part of the bone was sticking through the skin.
They called an ambulance and they took him to
the hospital and nobody saw Adrian again for,
it had to be a couple weeks.
I wished it would have been different but I had to
protect myself, and uh, protect my reputation.
Anyway, I got fired about a month later.
Let go.
I kind of felt bad for him. It had to sting getting
his ass whipped in front of everybody.
All the wrestlers that watched him.
When you're a guy that everybody fears and that
happens to you, you kind of lose a little bit of face
and, and, and...
I don't want to say respect, but...
You kind of lose something when that happens, yeah.
And it was horrible for Adrian because,
I don't think he ever really recovered from that.
Humiliated after the confrontation with Spivey,
Adrian spirals further into his cocaine addiction.
Adrian was starting to show a lot of decline,
and then he was getting heavier, and he was uh,
wasn't moving like he used to.
He wasn't, he wasn't the guy he used to be
and I think he knew that.
The trouble with substance abuse is when you do
find time to eat, you gorge yourself
and then you fall asleep.
So you're eating tons of calories,
and it's got no place to go except as tissue on your body.
♪
He told me, "Damn, I'm reaching 300."
I didn't see that.
Maybe because I was his wife I did not see that.
I just saw him.
He didn't know how to stop.
I don't think he knew how to change it
without changing his whole life.
Adonis had the match won!
In May of 1987, Adrian suddenly leaves the WWF.
Leaving in shame and disgust.
Though the reasons are unclear,
rumours backstage suggest he was fired for substance abuse.
♪
I just know that Adrian suddenly disappeared,
where he wasn't on the cards anymore.
I think guys like me just assumed
he'll be back in a few weeks.
♪
I thought for a second he may have had enough!
The next time I saw Adrian he was 400 pounds.
Him and I wrestled in Las Vegas.
We thought this would be a great match.
We were doing a international television champion.
I think Adonis is just too big
for the of frame Greg Gagne.
And we got in the ring, he was breathing so hard.
We barely made 10 minutes.
Orton is trying to drag Adonis back to the ring.
We sat down in the locker room and we just talked.
And I told him, I said, "Jesus, Adrian,
what have you done? God almighty,
why don't you go get back to your regular weight.
You're one of the great performers of all time.
This isn't you, and you know from our philosophy,
'be yourself, be who you are'."
Oh!
And, maybe that night woke him up a little bit.
Still only 34 years old, Adrian commits to
getting back in shape, losing nearly 100 pounds
over the next 6 months.
Ditching the "Adorable One" persona,
he sets his sights on competing in Japan.
[Cheering]
Life was great. Everything was great.
Just a happy family.
It was over happy.
I saw him in Tokyo.
I ran across him at a popular place for the,
for the American guys, "gaijins", to eat.
Steakhouse. I saw him there.
I had a beer with him, shook hands and uh, you know,
sorry things happened the way it did, you know.
So, we had a beer.
Yeah, pretty much.
I remember having dinner with him and Bea.
He really did seem like
he was getting his life together again.
Getting ready for, uh, a big comeback.
He was at that age where
he could still turn things around.
Reinvent himself and come back.
And I don't think anyone ever thought, "Oh
that's the last we'll hear of Adrian Adonis."
The last time I saw Keith was in LA in a hotel room.
He had flew in from Japan.
I met him that night.
That morning he was to fly out to Canada.
♪
He came back to the room to tell me goodbye
a second time, he had never done that.
♪
Um, that was our last goodbye,
the last time I saw him alive.
♪
Leaving his wife in Los Angeles,
Adrian departs for Canada where his fate will
intersect with a pair of veteran wrestlers
known as the Kelly Twins.
I was the only survivor at that time.
Quite a tragedy.
Adrian Adonis, he was a tough boy and uh,
he loved being in the ring.
He was a good boy.
My name's Mike Kelly, and I've been
a professional wrestler for 23 and a half years with
my twin brother, Pat.
People had probably known me from the Oh Henry commercial.
When you consider how big it is.
Back years ago, that big chocolate fudge.
It's that big chocolate fudge.
♪
The Kelly twins were veteran wrestlers that I remember
from the 60s, they worked for my dad.
Identical twins.
You couldn't tell which one you were talking to.
This is when we were in Japan.
A bunch of us sitting around a sushi bar,
drinking and eating.
I think this was in Tokyo. Hacksaw Higgins.
I think my brother fell in love that night.
Gosh, we were inseparable.
We enjoyed being together, doing things together.
My mother always dressed us the same.
If Pat had a black coat on, I'd wear a black coat.
If he had brown shoes, then I would wear brown shoes.
We had identical diamond rings.
Identical watches. Identical hats.
We lived our life as twins.
He got hurt one time, and I wasn't there,
and I knew something was wrong, I says,
"My brother's hurt." I could feel it.
We had that special bond, which was good for us.
We were working, like, around Toronto.
Dave McKigney, the promoter, he had called and
asked us if we wanted to come down to Newfoundland.
And I says, "Well, yeah,
we'll come down and wrestle for ya."
So we packed up our van and drove down with uh,
my brother and I,
and Adrian Adonis come in from Japan.
The main event was Adrian Adonis with "The Bearman"
against my brother and I.
Dave McKigney was
a journeyman wrestler who promoted shows,
and his gimmick was that he had a bunch of bears
living at his house that he trained to wrestle.
So, that's where he got the name "The Bearman."
Dave was the complete old school guy.
He was a good person and a good promoter,
and one of the best payout men ever.
My name is Ricky "Soulman" Johnson.
I borrowed the name from my brother Rocky Johnson
actually, because we were partners for a long time and
he passed away, so, I decided to
honour him by, um, using his nickname.
Bearman stories were almost like a travelling circus.
We had -----, kidgets, bears- [Laughing]
There was something for everyone.
Dave "The Bearman", he owned the
wrestling bear, um, "Terrible Ted."
It's kind of a rib if the promoter tells you,
"You're wrestling the wrestling bear tonight."
It's like, like, really? Like, are you kidding me?
♪
I wouldn't get near the bear.
A bear has so much strength, like, you know,
it could tear you apart in less than half a minute.
Actually, there was an incident
with Bearman's girlfriend.
Apparently she was upstairs taking a shower and
the bear had sensed it,
and Bearman was working in the garden.
♪ [Suspenseful] ♪
And the bear had actually came up into the bathroom.
[Growling and screaming]
Clawed her to death.
♪
The bear had tore her to pieces.
It was a tragedy when I heard it,
I just couldn't believe it.
He was supposed to marry this young lady.
Despite this tragedy, McKigney continues
to work with bears on his next tour.
An 8-week trek across Newfoundland with
a troop of wrestlers that includes the Kelly twins,
Ricky Johnson, and Adrian Adonis.
It was great. Everybody was happy,
everybody was making money.
And the people in Newfoundland
were so very nice to us.
We were in Gander, Newfoundland.
The next night, we had to wrestle
in Lewisporte, Newfoundland.
The mayor of Lewisporte phoned the hotel in Gander,
a Holiday Inn- [Coughing]-
it's just hard to talk about. [Laughing]
Um, and he asked would any of the wrestlers come to
Lewisporte that night that we were off,
because they'd like to throw a party for us.
July 4th 1988,
he had called me 3 times,
and the last phone call he had made to me, he said,
"I'm getting ready to get on a ferry,
I just want to tell you I love you." And I just said,
"Call me later, honey, call me later."
Adrian got in Pat's van, the Canadian Wildman
he got in the van with the Kellys,
and I was just getting ready to climb in,
and Phil blew his horn.
He said, "Why don't you come with me?"
And I said, "Sure, that's cool."
Adrian, the Wildman, and the Kelly twins
were 10 to 15 minutes ahead of us, I guess.
Me and Phil "Whipper" Watson Junior, Little T,
we were just riding down the road having a few laughs.
Everything was all backed up and
going like 2 miles an hour.
So, I said to Phil, "Must have been an accident."
Traffic like this in Newfoundland, you know?
Then I looked over into the water
and I seen a red van in the water.
It's an image that will never leave my mind.
♪
We were travelling to Lewisporte, Newfoundland,
so that we could advertise and talk about wrestling.
There was a guy there with a camera,
he was gonna take some pictures of us.
My brother and I, Adrian, and the Bearman.
It was about 8 o'clock at night.
It was as broad daylight as it is at noon.
Pure daylight, I couldn't believe it.
It was amazing. Freaked me right out.
It looks like a desert out there, actually.
We had to go around these big rocks.
We just barely got through with our van.
We were going down the highway
and I saw a little bear cub.
My brother, the reflection of the sun,
caught the sight of his eye and he had, uh,
swerved to the left where the grass was.
The van had gotten down in a little gulley and
hit this huge rock dead on.
♪
And I fainted.
And I woke up and I felt this water was ice cold.
I just wondered what had happened, like,
why am I in this stream?
Then finally I saw my brother behind the wheel,
slouched on the steering wheel.
♪
He had passed away.
I could tell right away...
yeah, it was horrifying.
♪
And uh...
♪
Give me a minute, please.
[Clearing throat]
♪
I seen the van in the water, and I said,
"That looks like the Kelly's van."
I knew it well.
I went down there with them in it, so...
Adrian Adonis was uh, in bad shape.
He was in real bad shape.
The Bearman died instantly.
Adrian he was moaning, "Help me, help me, help me."
I remember Adrian's elbow,
all you could see was the bone sticking out of it.
I remember thinking, like, we gotta save them.
But there was no saving them.
♪
It was 4th of July, so you know,
we were celebrating with all my cousins in Bakersfield.
And I do remember,
we had just like a little get together.
I have a cousin that's scared to death of fireworks so
my other cousin went in to check, answered the phone,
they asked for Mrs. Franke.
I just remember she came out screaming out of the house
he was... passed, he had- he was dead.
They said, "Keith has been killed.
He was killed in an auto accident."
I said, "Put Dave on the phone,"
Dave McKigney, and he said, "He's dead."
I said, "Put one of the Kelly twins on, I don't know,
you put someone on."
Um, and then the RCMP
called me that night,
and he was, he was gone.
The first few days after his passing I was still in shock.
I did not want to believe it.
Dead is former WWF star "Adorable" Adrian Adonis.
Also killed was Pat Kelly, on the left,
his twin brother Mike, on the right,
was the only survivor of the crash.
Oh yes. Yes.
We're half an hour apart and he was uh,
he was very close to me.
Where he went, I followed behind.
Where I went, he followed behind.
We were inseparable.
The whole world changed, yeah.
In more ways than one 'cause a couple of road guys-
[Clearing throat] ...that worked for
Dave McKigney "The Bearman",
they jumped in the water also,
and they robbed Adrian.
They took his money, watch,
whatever he had, whatever valuables he had.
[Bea] They were arrested, and yes,
I did want to press charges.
Just due to the fact that, what? Why?
Why rob a dead man?
♪
So, yeah, we went to a motel in Lewisporte.
We went to the bar.
Some of the guys just to relax,
they wanted to shoot pool.
So they had a couple of drinks.
Then somebody says, "They're all ----ing dead."
Like it just hit them.
[Shattering]
Next thing I know, I just seeing
stuff flying and glasses were flying.
Then all hell just broke loose.
♪
And I remember seeing the manager of the motel,
he was just standing off to the side against the wall,
with a pen and paper.
He gave us a bill the next morning.
I think it was 12,000 bucks for the damage.
The next day we drove by the scene of the accident.
Some guys were praying, some were crying, and uh,
CBC came, and they wanted to know
if booze was involved and stuff.
We told them to ---- off, get away from us.
Don't you realize what happened here?
♪
Though it's never been proven,
some have suggested that the accident that killed
wrestlers Adrian Adonis, Dave McKigney, and Pat Kelly,
resulted from drinking and driving.
I don't like to think of Keith dying like that.
They probably were coming from a wrestling match party
and having a good time.
No, no drugs, no alcohol.
The doctors had checked all that on me and there was no...
Definitely not. No, definitely not.
I keep a photo of him in my wallet at all times.
I have, uh, photos of him in my bedroom.
♪
Yeah, he was my life.
♪
But, things have to go on.
♪
By the grace of God, it could be you, you know?
Because you never know, we're on the road every night.
Guys were drinking a 12-pack of beer, smoking, you know,
joints and snorting coke,
and driving a hundred miles an hour.
And nobody got killed.
Here's a guy doing the right thing,
and he ends up dying in a tragic accident.
When all of us guys are out here doing the wrong shit
and we're still alive-
How does that balance out?
I guess God was right, the good die young.
I think Keith was one of the best.
He was one of my closest friends
even though we were miles apart.
I was in a federal prison in Texas when he died,
I was in custody,
so I wasn't able to go to the funeral.
I remember Bea telling me that, um,
he was so big that nothing could ever hurt him.
I remember thinking the same thing,
like he was indestructible.
The whole funeral was a blur.
It really didn't hit me until later.
Getting back to home while he was in Japan, um,
and this closet in this new home had
his jacket with the New York emblem.
Adrian Adonis!
That was the only thing in that closet,
I don't know who put it there.
I could just smell him.
Everything came flooding back
and that's when it, it really hit me.
♪
I took that damn jacket and I went to bed.
And that was, that was the finality of it. You know?
He was never coming home, ever.
Yes, he sure would. You gotta stay strong.
And that's the way I've lived my life after
my brother had passed, and I'll just keep going.
Ah, we'll do the best we can.
It's all we can do.
♪
Adrian Adonis was a very, very talented guy,
and I don't think he ever got the due for his talent
that he should have.
Just because it was not an era where
people really recognized that.
Like, if a guy with the talent of Adrian Adonis was
around today everybody would know how good he is,
and he would be a big, big star.
World Wrestling Federation
tag team champion Adrian Adonis!
He should be honoured.
He should be in the Hall of Fame.
He's a Hall of Famer, without a doubt.
♪
I think that if Adrian hadn't have been in that accident,
I don't think it's impossible to think that um,
five years later he'd do Wrestlemania,
Bret Hart versus Adrian Adonis.
Like, who knows?
I would want him to know how much I appreciate all the
little bits of advice and encouragement that he gave me
all through my career,
and just the friendship that I had.
I learned so much from him
and I never take it for granted.
I would have given anything to have an Adrian Adonis
waiting for me in the ring.
He was the real deal.